


Tenebrae

by ishtarelisheba



Series: Tenebrae [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Mental Health Issues, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-22
Updated: 2014-06-22
Packaged: 2018-02-05 17:58:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1827199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishtarelisheba/pseuds/ishtarelisheba
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A ficlet. Gold has to deal with the repercussions of surviving being Zelena's prisoner and slave for a year.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tenebrae

He's tried to sit in the dark. During the day, on the edge of the tub in the guest bathroom, lights turned out. Trying to force himself to accept it, to desensitize himself to it, now that he's "safe." He didn't last three minutes before scrabbling for the switch, heart trying to pound from his chest, humiliated. He can't even _sleep_ in the dark, now.  
  
He'd never been afraid of the dark. Even before he had magic, there was hardly such thing as perfect darkness in daily life - not inside the hovel he shared with Bae. There were precious candles, and there was daylight or the hearthfire that crackled year-round. After magic, he had no need to fear the darkness. He _was_ the thing to fear. Now they sleep with the master bath light on and the door ajar to let in the yellow glow of the bathroom overhead fixture, and he mumbles an apology for it every night as he crosses the room to get into bed.  
  
He wakes with a start, jack-knifing upright with an arm shot out before him. He breathes so hard his throat and lungs ache. He was there again. He is most nights. Rusted cage and mildewed straw, the sour aura of his filthy clothing, the paste smell of the gruel. The skin-crawling feel of foreign hands on him. Utter darkness.  
  
His sweet wife wakes beside him without admonition, laying one hand on his knee and the other on his arm until it relaxes and falls back to his lap. The nightmare is fresh behind his eyes, and he jumps when she touches him, hating himself for it. He’s managed for the most part to stop those flinches during the day.  
  
"You're home," she reassures in a sleepy - sleep deprived, perhaps, and his fault, that - voice. She knows what he dreams of. He's said enough in distressed whispers into their pillows that she knows. "Sweetheart? You're home."  
  
"I'm sorry-" he begins, and he's not sure how to finish it. _That I'm like this now, that I'm broken, that I can't stop it, that I'm worse even than the thing you married..._ But he finishes with a simple echo. "I'm sorry."  
  
"You haven't anything to be sorry for," she says, her voice steel now, though the hardness there isn't directed at him. "Come on. Lie down."  
  
He lets her kind hands guide him back down to the pillows and her arms, and though he's more thankful for the latter than he'll ever be able to express, his eyes still snap open every few minutes to make sure that the slim ray of light still pours in from the bathroom doorway.

**Author's Note:**

> Tenebrae - Latin; darkness.


End file.
